Peach Creek Pictures
by Thermal Man
Summary: It all begins with Edd blowing up during lunch and yelling at Eddy. And from there, things quickly spin out of control.
1. Jonny

It's nice out, Jonny thought. He was sitting alone at a table in Peach Creek High School's cafeteria, taking hearty bites out of a green apple. It was spring, and outside the air was getting warmer and trees were sprouting leaves. Today in particular was beautiful. It was the sort of day where you could feel the sun's rays beating down on you, filling you with a warmth and serene happiness that you couldn't get any other way.

Finishing his apple, Jonny decided that it'd be a waste to sit inside all lunch. Picking up his drawing pad and chucking away the apple core, Jonny made his way out of the cafeteria. Two steps away from the door, goosebumps rose on his tanned arms and Jonny stopped. He could feel a moment fast approaching, and he didn't want to miss it.

Jonny turned around and leaned his gangly body against the nearby wall. His eyes strained and scoured the cafeteria, searching. Then he saw it. Ed, Edd and Eddy were sitting together as usual. Eddy was ranting and shouting to the other two, whatever it was about didn't matter though, at least not to Jonny. It didn't factor into this moment. Edd was staring at Eddy, an anger growing and growing behind his eyes. It seemed to be trying to push its way out. Edd didn't seem to be in a mood to fight it, as he slammed his toothpick arms down on the table, shaking the trays and knocking a milk carton over. He shouted at Eddy, neck veins straining. He kept shouting for a full minute and the longer he continued, the angrier Edd became and the quieter everyone else was in the cafeteria. Then, as if Edd was cut off from the well he had been drawing from, he stopped and looked around sheepishly.

He quickly slung his bookbag around his shoulder and left the cafeteria along with a silent Ed and Eddy. Slowly the other students began to talk again and sound returned to full force. Only Ed and Eddy stayed silent. Ed was trying to understand what had just happened, and you could see the confusion and turmoil on his face. Eddy, on the other hand was absolutely seething and pissed.

Probably at Edd, Jonny thought. In hindsight, Jonny was surprised it hadn't happened sooner. There had always been a bit of tension between Ed and Eddy, but in recent weeks something, Jonny wasn't sure what, no one told him anything, something had created real friction between them. Their friendship was getting more and more strained, and Jonny supposed today was the day the camel's back broke. That was it, Ed and Eddy's friendship was over and the trio of Eds broken up, whatever it meant for them.

Still, no use to wonder about things he couldn't find out or at least not to do it outside, Jonny thought as he pushed away from the wall and walked outside. He sat down at the top of a green hill and put his drawing pad down. His scarred hand searched his pocket for his MP3. After a moment, Jonny found it and raised his hand victoriously. Then he began the arduous task of untangling the cords and popped each headphone in an ear. Scrolling through the glowing screen's menus, Jonny selected his personal playlist.

The music began to beat and flow through his veins and Jonny could feel inspiration coming. He grabbed the drawing pad; it was brand new besides a sketch of Plank on the first page. His good hand gripped a pencil and began to move over the blank page. Jonny was going to capture that moment, with the sun shining down on him and the music blasting throughout him.

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><p><em>AN: A fitting introduction for this fanfiction, I think. There isn't going to be a main plotline for this fanfiction. I'm planning on having it be a collection of one-shots, as I prefer getting a nice, intimate glimpse at a moment (plus I hate writing out long-form stories). But who knows, that might change Anyway, that's all! Please review, people! I'd sure appreciate it!_


	2. Edd

Stupid stupid stupid was all Edd thought as he raced through the tiled hallways to the men's bathroom, his face burning. That was a stupid thing to do. Why did he have to blow up right there, in front of everyone? Edd reached the bathroom and took a quick glance around. There was a single boy there, using a urinal. Ignoring him, Edd stood in front of the mirror, gripping the sink with his bony fingers and staring at himself. All he saw was a sixteen year-old kid with a fiery red face who couldn't control himself.

Good lord, why was his face blushing so much and why did it feel so hot? Edd's hands went for the faucet handle and clumsily turned it. He cupped them together underneath the falling water, which slowly pooled in his hands. When it felt right, Edd splashed the cool, refreshing liquid over his face. It calmed him down slightly, and Edd repeated the gesture several times before he felt in control and like himself again.

Reaching into his bookbag and pulling out a napkin, Edd began to dry himself off. That was a bad start, he inwardly winced. Quite bad. Everyone would whisper about this for days and throw sidelong glances at him when they thought he wasn't looking. It would pass with time for most of them, but that wasn't what was bothering Edd. No, he was more concerned about his friends and acquaintances. This was a bad way to come out, the only worse way he could think of is if he was caught with his limbs entangled with another boy's, their faces locked together. Their views could be negatively colored by this and- oh good lord, what if they thought he was _gay_?

Edd's mind went blank and his hand went into a fist, and even though he still had the napkin in his hand, Edd could feel his fingers biting into his palm. He would have to do damage control on this, it was absolutely necessary. He'd have to talk with Eddy and try to make sure that he didn't go around telling everyone that he was a fag, or however he would crudely put it. Then he'd have to try to talk with Nazz. Everyone always talked to her about everything, and if anyone were to spread rumors about him, Nazz would know. After that, Edd supposed he'd just have to be open about his sexuality and his remorse about the outburst, he assumed.

Releasing a long drawn out breath that he didn't even know he was holding, Edd pocketed his napkin and took a step to leave but saw the other boy was still here. He was staring quizzically at Edd, an unspoken question being raised with his eyes. Raising his hands, Edd tried on a shaky smile and said, his voice less calm and steady than he would have liked "I'm fine. No need to worry. I just had a sudden surprise and was shocked out of my wits. Really, I'm fine."

The boy continued to stare, his dark green eyes boring into Edd. He opened his mouth, as if he were going to say something and then they boy snapped his jaw closed and nodded. He walked out of the bathroom, with Edd following him behind.

He stopped in front of the cafeteria's wide open double doors. Edd knew what he had to do, knew how to deal with this and that he should begin fixing this immediately. But Edd didn't want to, at least right now. So instead of walking into the cafeteria, where Edd could began setting things back to what he called 'normal,' Edd walked to the library and began to search it's crowded shelves for a book. Scanning the spines' titles, his eyes momentarily stopped on a plain looking book. Pulling it out, he looked at the cover. _Ordinary People by Judith Guest_ it said. It was yellowish, as if the book had been forgotten and left to age in a corner. There were four people on the cover, but only three of them had a border around them, as if someone had taken a photo. Edd turned the book over and felt an instant connection with this book as he read the caption.

_"They are ordinary people, after all. For a time they had entered the world of the newspaper statistic; a world where any measure you took to feel better was temporary, at best, but that is over. This is permanent. It must be."_

Edd took a seat, and opened the book as he began to read the first page.

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><p><em>AN: __Let me get this out of the way. Edd is gonna like boys in my fanfics. Deal with it._

__ And I know I said this was going to be a collection of one-shots, but last chapter just led to this one so nicely. I hadn't even planned it, but when thinking about what I should write next, this just came to my mind and I knew I had to do it.__

__Again, reviews are appreciated very much. Thanks for reading!__


	3. Kevin

"Man, what a way to come out," Kevin says, smiling at the image of the scene in his head and talking with Nazz on the way to his next class.

"No kidding, dude. I wonder what's going through his head right now?" she asks.

"My money's on him completely freaking out over this and hiding. Guy's completely spineless."

"That sounds about right," Nazz says. A small frown grows on her face, and the easy-going happy tone her voice had disappears. "Sometimes I worry about Edd though."

"Yeah? Why?" Kevin asks.

"Well, he just seems to bottle everything up, you know? And then he… explodes, like he did today. It isn't a healthy way to live or be."

"I guess, yeah." Kevin says. Silently he's frustrated that he doesn't say more. He's always been bad at talking about emotions, whether they're his or just feelings in general.

"Oh! Here's my class!" Nazz shouts, and gives a brief hug. "Talk with you later Kevin!"

As Nazz turns and enters the classroom, Kevin takes note of her fine ass and curves being hugged by her tight outfit. Not for the first time, he wished that things had worked out between them.

On the rest of the way to auto repair he wonders how things could have turned out differently and idly greets people in passing. He isn't exactly sad as he thinks these thoughts, rather he's wistful.

Kevin makes his way into the shop-like class, throwing his binder into his locker. After a second's thought, he throws his long sleeved shirt in too, leaving Kevin in a dirty white tank top and showing off his well-developed muscles. He slams the locker shut and then makes his way over to the jeep he's been working on all year. It's come a long way since he found it in the dump. He had changed the tires, along with the entire front end suspension and the gas tank, not that you could tell by looking. He hadn't done any body work on it yet, Kevin hated body work and was absolutely terrible at it. He planning on saving it for last, and it was soon approaching. As a result, it was rusted most everywhere, with the few spots of gray paint left peeling away and the entire front body and hood missing.

He kept meaning to ask Marie to help him fix the body up. Besides the fact that she's amazing at body work and with cars, it'd also be an excuse for him to spend some time with her. Which recently had been a plus.

As if his thoughts summoned her, Kevin heard the familiar _thunk_ of Marie Kanker's approaching boots from behind. Kevin turns and leans against the jeep to greet her, expecting to see her sporting that sly grin she often has. Instead, she's frowning with her black eyebrows furrowed together creating wrinkles everywhere, and ruining her normally beautiful face.

"Hey Marie," he says, a bit uneasy. She was never easy to deal with when in a bad. "What's up?"

"Oh nothing," she says, voice too loud for it to be true. "I only just found out that my chances with my man, my dreamboat, went from a snowball's chance in hell to gone."

"Oh," Kevin responds, trying to be tactful, "You heard about Double Dee?"

"_Yes I heard_," she hisses, "That Double-Dee is a fag who is going to get the beating of a lifetime. Motherfucker made me waste four years."

"I thought you got over Double-Dee?" Kevin asks, a bit of hope dying inside him. Over the course of sophomore year, Marie had cooled off slightly and stopped viciously attacking Edd. Kevin had hoped that Marie had gotten over Edd. She still did flirt with him, but that was something Marie did with everyone, period. He had hoped that the flirting was empty, meaningless. Kevin guessed he was wrong.

"What? No, dumbshit," Marie cusses "I was trying to be smooth. You know, be nice and civil and shit to Double Dee so I could snag my man. But turns out, that was for nothing! Five months of holding back from pouncing on him, and then Double-Dee has the nerve to be gay! Son of a bitch!"

Boom. There it is. Kevin's chances just died right there. Frowning, Kevin coldly states, "Speaking of bitches, if you're going to be one, just get out of here Marie."

"What's bugging you, dickweed? You gay too?" she says. Kevin can tell she just wants to get a rise out of him, wants to start a fight, so he turns his back to her and pretends to return to working on the jeep. After a moment of silence, Marie cusses and says "Fine. I don't even why I came here today. I should be hunting down Edd."

Kevin releases a sigh as he hears Marie walk away. He ignores the urge to turn around and stare, instead opting to try to lose himself in his work.

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><p><em>AN: Oh man, I am on a role! A new chapter spurned out in only two days! I feel pretty good about this chapter. The dialogue flows smoothly and we get to see Nazz, Kevin and Marie. Course my opinion on this chapter'll probably radically change in the morning, when I wake up with a refreshed mind and a critical eye and see damning grammatical mistakes and awkward phrasing. Oh well. I just wanna upload this now and go to sweet, sweet sleep._

_F.Y.I. I'm not sure what's happened, but I've got solid ideas where this story is gonna go, and it'll take a while to write, so this most definitely isn't going to be a collection of one-shot. I'm trying to think up a new title for this, but am coming up blank for now. If any of you have some ideas for a title, PM it to me or leave it in a review._

_Sorry for those of you with virgin ears. All the cussing in this chapter is a necessity. The Kanker sisters in general just have foul mouths like most teens and Marie is in a particularly bad mood._

_Thanks for reading, along with any reviews you guys write._


	4. Marie

Marie Kanker was a crass teen who was stuck in the awkward land between child and adult. Like most teens, she was entirely ruled by her emotions. Marie knew this fact (even if she would never tell anyone) and embraced it. Marie also knew the only difference between her and most teens was that if someone wronged or angered her, Marie wouldn't spread sad excuses for lies around or end a friendship, rather she'd pull her fist back and knock them out cold.

This, along with her short temper and general take no shit attitude, had given Marie a reputation as someone to avoid and never mess with if you valued your well being. It was because of this reputation that no one in Mr. Noughton's English class had done a thing when she kicked the door to his class in, and it was because of this reputation why they were still doing nothing now that she had Mr. Noughton slammed against the chalkboard, one hand curled around his shirt's collar, her pale face an inch away from his and her other hand balled up into a fist and reared back.

"Where's Edd?" she asked, her voice halfway between a shout and an order. This was her _ex_-dreamboat's English; the frail, stick-limbed kid had to be in here.

Noughton faced a momentary crisis. As a teacher and authority figure, it wouldn't do to tell someone who obviously wanted to harm one of his students where said student was. Especially when it Marie asking, and when that student was a bright young man who was dealing with an identity crisis and trying to come to terms with who he was. On the other hand, Noughton never was good with pain. He wasn't good with it as a child, when he skinned his knees running around the forest behind his house. He wasn't good with it in highschool. He most certainly wasn't good back when he played baseball all those years ago and took a cherry wood bat to the face. And nothing had changed. He still winced and swore and overreacted to the slightest injury. And here, right in front of him was Marie Kanker, a raging powerhouse of violence and pain.

Noughton gulped. Lord help him. The stocky teacher raised his hand, and slapped Marie's off his shirt. The teen took a step back, momentarily stunned. "Marie Kanker, you've finally crossed the line. Breaking into a classroom and threatening a teacher," he stated, a hard dangerous edge in his voice. "I wonder Marie: Did you think this through? At all?"

The blue haired teen darted her green eye away and grimaced. She took a step back and leaned against Noughton's shiny, new oakwood desk. Her hands were tightly wrapped around its edges. The teacher found it funny (and reassuring) that the blue haired teen was staring at his English class instead of him now.

"What do you think is going to happen? Do you believe that the school's faculty is that lax and inattentive, that you could get away with this scot-free? Because I can tell you that it's not. No school is so poorly run as to be able to ignore a teacher being threatened by a student."

A little voice inside him told Mr. Noughton to stop. He was done. The whole situation was done. There was nowhere else he could imagine taking this speech and Marie was good, for lack of a better word. She realized she went too far, she must have. He can just walk Marie out of here, and into Ms. Krechenski's office, where she could sort everything.

And Mr. Noughton agreed with this inner voice and wrapped it up with a simple question. Too bad it was the wrong one.

"Are you that dense to believe that, to _think that_?"

Marie's head immediately snapped to stare at Mr. Noughton, her one visible eye twitching. The portly teacher gulped, despite himself. Suddenly, he felt very small and that he was the one who had made the mistake.

Pushing herself away from the desk and back into the man's personal space in one swift motion, Marie snarled out, "I'm not fucking stupid, unlike you Nougatty Noughton."

One hand grabbed his white shirt. It felt like an iron claw to the very scared teacher.

"I don't care that there's a room of snitches watching."

The other hand grabbed his collared shirt, twisting and wrapping the cloth to get an even better grip.

"I don't fucking care that I'm going to get expelled."

Both of Marie's arms put all of her strength into lifting up a man three times her size off the ground.

"I DO FUCKING CARE THAT YOU AREN'T TELLING ME WHERE DOUBLE-DICK SUCKER IS!"

Marie Kanker let loose and threw Noughton over his desk and into three students' seats. Leaping over the desk, Marie walked toward Noughton, ignoring all else and focusing on her dazed prey. Her boot's heel dropped onto his hand and began to twist and turn. There were audible noises that went with these movements. Noughton's cries of pain were in sync with these noises.

"Please stop! Please stop. Please. Please please please," Noughton weakly pleaded, trying to pull his hand free to no avail. "Please just stop."

Lifting her heel, Marie grabbed Noughton by his, her fingers snaring themselves around his roots. She crouched down to his level and roughly yanked his head up. He looked pathetic, with a small gash on his forehead and his eyes pouring water.

Her free hand gave Noughton a hay-maker. Marie could feel his nose snapping, and let go of him. Noughton's head weakly bounced against the blue carpeted floor and then stayed still. Leaning in close, Marie could hear the broken man quietly sobbing. Grinning, Marie congratulated herself on not losing her touch and grabbed Noughton again.

He stared at her, a terrified look on his broken face and hoping with no hope that she wouldn't ask. She grinned, and Noughton swore to himself, hoping that Edd would understand.

"Now," Marie spat out, "Tell me where Edd is."

"He's-" Noughton stopped for a moment and silently uttered _Lord help me_, "He's in the library, reading a book. I saw him there during lunch."

"Fina-fucking-ly." Marie shouted. She slammed Noughton's head against the ground one last time, and then rose. She walked out, ignoring the silent students now lining the walls. A foot from the door and Marie turned. "Whoever I hear snitched first gets a beating twice as worse as his."

And with that, Marie left Mr. Noughton's English class.

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><p><em>AN: And after months and months, I'm back! Sorry 'bout the wait. School got hectic and then my life got hectic and then I got a job and more and more things just kept getting in the way of this. And then when I did come back I had no inspiration, even though I knew where this was vaguely going. But I'm back, as I said, and I've found my inspiration again, so all should be well! For a while, at least._

_I'm really conflicted on this chapter. Originally Nazz was going to be in Mr. Noughton's shoes, but then I switched her out because I wasn't sure if I could write Nazz correctly. I'm wondering if you guys would prefer this as it is, with Mr. Noughton, or with Nazz instead? It won't change the story much, if at all. Just this one scene._

_Thanks for reading!_


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